Pierre d'Alancaisez

Vlatka Horvat

By the Means at Hand

The Croatian pavilion , Venice

Curated by Antonia Majača
On until 24 November 2024

The elegant simplicity of Horvat’s project should have been a breath of fresh air in the ideologically fecund edition of the Biennale. Responding to Adriano Pedrosa’s facile call to foreignness, the London-based Croatian artist solicited reflections on non-belonging from her international crowd of art world friends, thus starting a letter chain. 

The pavilion is filled with cutesy poems and doodles. “Young man (35) from Sarajevo seeks a person to discuss art with” jests one, “return to Serbian poets all their books” urges another. Hundreds of these pieces and printouts of the emails which gave rise to them are on show in a sleek purpose-made archive management system which accounts for one of this review’s stars.

Art history books claim that mail art was something once. Horvat’s presentation today, however, is so banal that it puts this legacy to a test. It turns art into a record that might come in handy to an NGO worker reporting on art world networking. Entirely by design, then, this closed circulation speaks to and agrees with only itself. 

notes and notices are short and curt exhibition reviews. Read more:

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Alvaro Barrington, Grandma’s Land at Sadie Coles ★★★☆☆

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The party slumps into a half-voiced political complaint and never recovers. This is what happens when instead of living culture, we ‘celebrate’ it.

Özgür Kar, Heavy Ground at Emalin ★★★☆☆

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Bhenji Ra, Biraddali Dancing on the Horizon at Auto Italia ★☆☆☆☆

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Such work was once a mere grift. Now, it is an outright stitch-up.

Gray Wielebinski, The Red Sun is High, the Blue Low at ICA ★☆☆☆☆

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The Red Sun is High, the Blue Low

I knew that it was possible to understand art and life less after seeing an exhibition. I didn’t, however, imagine that experiencing Wielebinski’s work twice would only compound such damage.

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